Conveyor belt skirt board



March 10, 1976 H. L. CLEGG 3,499,523

CONVEYOR BELT SKIRT BOARD Filed May 20, 1968 INVENTOR. HARDEMA/V L. CLEG'G ATTORNEY.

United States Patent 3,499,523 CONVEYOR BELT SKIRT BOARD Hardeman Lee Clegg, 8645 Lime Ave., Fontana, Calif. 92335 Filed May 20, 1968, Ser. No. 730,453 Int. Cl. B65g 15/08, 21/00 US. Cl. 198--204 3 Claims ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE A rigid side board overlying a side marginal area of a conveyor belt, with a flexible skirt overlapping and extending downwardly from said board, a simple lever actuaed clamp providing for clamping said flexible skirt to said board to hold the same in place, and facilitating quick vertical readjustment of said skirt as its lower edge Wears, and ultimately, the replacement of said skirt by a new skirt.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION Conveyor belt equipment for use in gravel pits and grain elevators for handling loose fluent material conventionally employ rigid side boards from six to ten feet in length which overlie side marginal areas of the conveyor belt at the points where the material to be conveyed is discharged onto the belt, the purpose of this being to prevent a temporary overloading of the belt at this particular point causing said material to overflow the sides of the belt.

It is also customary for conveyor belts of this type to be supported on a platform or a bed of idle rollers, with edge portions of the paltform or bed being inclined upwardly at a slight angle from the central portion thereof to give a like inclination to an edge portion of the belt so as to retain on the belt loose material deposited thereon. The aforementioned side boards are located inwardly a slight distance from the outer edges of the belt and generally over the upwardly inclined edge portions of the belt.

It has also been conventional practice to supply said side boards with a flexible skirt which overlaps the outer face of the board and extends downwardly below the lower edge thereof into light contact with the conveyor belt so as to prevent fine material, deposited on the belt at this point, escaping laterally therefrom. Because of the wear thus produced on the lower edge of the skirt, it was necessary to arrange for some means of attaching the skirt to the board whereby the skirt might be adjusted downwardly when necessary to re-establish contact be tween the lower edge of the skirt and the belt. Heretofore the means employed for this purpose was awkward to operate so that considerable time was consumed in making each vertical adjustment of a skirt on the side board.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is a principal object of the present invention to greatly facilitate the vertical adjustment of the above discussed flexible skirt on a conveyor side board so that this may conveniently be done more frequently and thus maintain such skirt at its maximum operating efliciency.

Another object of the invention is to likewise facilitate the ease with which said flexible skirt, when badly worn, may be replaced by a new one.

Still another object of the invention is to provide a simple eccentric clamping means comprising a horizontal shaft rotatably mounted just outside of said skirt and rockable by a lever, secured to one end thereof, between locked and unlocked positions, and the provision on said shaft of an eccentric cam which clamps said skirt against 3,499,523 Patented Mar. 10, 1970 ice said side board when said lever is in closed position and completely frees said skirt from such pressure when said lever is in open position.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIGURE 1 is a side elevational view of a preferred embodiment of the present invention mounted rigidly in operative relation with a marginal side area of a belt conveyor, and showing the clamping means in skirt locking position.

FIGURE 2 is a vertical sectional view taken on the line 22 of FIGURE 1.

FIGURE 3 is a view similar to FIGURE 2 but shows the clamping means in unlocked position as when inserting, removing or vertically adjusting the skirt of the invention.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT The invention 10 includes a rigid conveyor side board 11 which is mounted when in use, in longitudinal overlying relation with a side marginal area of a conveyor belt 12 for preventing lateral escape from said belt of loose material 13 conveyed thereon. Being no part of the present invention, the means for so supporting side board 11 are not shown in the drawings. Any suitable super structure overlying said conveyor belt may be employed for this purpose.

The conveyor belt 12 is supported in its lengthwise travel by transverse sets of rollers, three in each set, the middle roller 14 of each set being horizontal and the lateral rollers 15 thereof being inclined upwardly at a small angle to support marginal belt edge portions 16 at a similar upward inclination.

The side board 11 is preferably made of a flat plate of steel about A" thick and has welded to the outer face thereof near its upper edge and near its opposite ends, a pair of inverted-L-shaped arms 17 and 18. The arm 17 is a slightly greater distance from the adjacent end of the board 11 than the arm 18 is from the opposite end of said board, thus leaving a free space 19 on the outer face of the board 11 located between the arm 17 and the adjacent end of said board.

The lower ends of arms 17 and 18 are disposed a short distance above the lower edge of board 11 and have aligned horizontal bores 20 in which is journaled a shaft 25, one end of which extends outwardly past arm 17 and is bent at a right angle and then at another right angle to form a lever 26, the outer bent end 27 of which lies in the same plane of rotation as the lever 26 with respect to the horizontal axis of the shaft 25. When the bent end 27 of lever 26 contacts the free space 19 of the outer surface of side board 11 as shown in FIG- URES 1 and 2, said lever is in skirt locking position. When said lever is swung downwardly as shown in FIG- URE 3, said lever is in skirt unlocking position.

Welded to the shaft 25 in the space between the arms 17 and 18 so as to be parallel with said shaft is a cylindrical bar 28 which forms an eccentric cam opposite ends of which terminate just within adjacent faces of the arms 17 and 18. When the lever 26 is in skirt locking position as shown in FIGURES 1 and 2, cam bar 28 is disposed inwardly relative to the axis of the shaft 25 and with its center disposed just below the horizontal plane of said axis. When the lever 26 is moved to skirt unlocking position as shown in FIGURE 3, the shaft 25 is rotated to shift the eccentric cam 28 of the invention outwardly a greater distance from the side board 11 than the distance which shaft 25 is spaced therefrom.

The invention 10 also includes a flexible skirt 29 which is preferably made of rubber and flexible but stiff enough to present substantial resistance to deformation. This skirt is approximately coextensive in length with the side board 11 and fits upwardly between the arms 17 and 18 and the board 11 into substantial overlapping relation with the outer face of said board while the lower edge of said skirt, which is preferably beveled as indicated at 30, engages the upper surface of side marginal portion 16 of the conveyor belt 12 as shown in FIGURES 2 and 3.

FIGURE 3 shows the invention as when the skirt 29 is being assembled therewith, with the conveyor belt 12 halted. The clamp lever 26 is here shown in unlocking position to allow the skirt 29 to be freely slipped between the arms 17 and 18 and the side board 11 to properly position the skirt in the general position in which this is shown in the drawings. With the conveyor belt 12 so halted, the lever 26 is now swung upwardly into locking position which causes the eccentric cam bar 28 to rotate into pressural relation with the skirt 29 so as to press said cam into the outer surface of said skirt and compress the latter between said cam bar and side board 11 whereby the skirt is fixed in the position in which it is thus clamped.

While vertical adjustment of the skirt 29 relative to side board 11 may be made while the conveyor belt is in operation, it is preferable to shut the conveyor down while making such an adjustment. With the present invention, this adjustment can be accomplished in a fraction of the time required by the prior art means for securing a side board skirt 29 to the side board of a belt conveyor. To do this, the lever 26 may merely be seized by the hand and pulled outwardly which causes it to remove the eccentric cam bar 28 from pressural relation with the skirt 29 and allow the lever 26 to come to rest against the inclined outer edge portion 16 of the conveyor belt 12 as shown in FIGURE 3. It then requires but a moment to readjust the vertical position of the skirt 29 to Where the lower edge again bears properly against the adjacent marginal portion of the conveyor belt 12 as shown in FIG- URE 3, after which the lever 26 is swung upwardly and pushed backward to its inward or skirt locking position shown in FIGURES 1 and 2 which clamps the skirt 29 in its readjusted position relative to the side board 11.

When a worn out skirt 29 is to be replaced with a new skirt, this can be accomplished in the same manner as above described for readjusting the vertical position of a skirt by merely withdrawing the worn out skirt from between the arms 17 and 18 and the side board 11 while the clamping means is open, replacing the worn out skirt with a new skirt, and returning the lever 26 to its upward or closed position.

I claim:

1. In combination:

a rigid side board mounted when in use in longitudinal overlying relation with a side marginal area of a conveyor belt for preventing lateral escape from said belt of loose material conveyed thereon;

a stiff but flexible skirt of sheet material overlapping said board and extending downwardly therefrom;

a pair of arms rigidly mounted at their upper ends on said board and extending downwardly in spaced relation with said board to overlie said skirt; and

lever actuated clamp means rotatably mounted on lower end portions of said arms on an axis parallel with said conveyor for clamping said skirt against said board and quickly operable to reposition said skirt on said board as the lower edge of said skirt wears.

2. A combination as recited in claim 1, wherein said clamp means includes:

bearing means on said arms aligned on said axis;

a shaft journaling in said bearing means;

a lever provided on said shaft for rotating the latter about said axis; and

eccentric means operated by rotation of said shaft to optionally apply pressure against said skirt to compress said skirt against said board and thus fix said skirt in a given vertical relation with said board, or release said skirt from such pressure leaving said skirt free for vertical adjustment relative to said board.

3. A combination as recited in claim 2, wherein said eccentric means comprises a cylindrical bar disposed parallel with said shaft and welded thereto, said bar terminating at its ends close to said arms.

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,593,610 4/1952 Roberts 198204 2,665,795 12/1954 Holwick 198-204 RICHARD E. AEGERTER, Primary Examiner 

